GPU Upgrade for 1440p

A

Andrew_Carr

2[H]4U
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Feb 26, 2005
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I'm having trouble with my 280x keeping up in games at 1440p lately, specifically Black Desert. So I'm trying to upgrade to something better for less than $400.

Here's my current build:
https://pchound.com/YDfm2I/
AMD 280x
i5-4690s
16GB RAM


I live in Japan, so prices are a bit different than what I can find on newegg/amazon.

So far what I see are:
Zotac GTX 980 4gb (refurb) for $200
r9 390 (used) for $200
R9 Fury (used) for $360
GTX 1080 (new) for $550
Vega 56 (new) for $590

Any thoughts on what would be something good to shoot for? I'm thinking about jumping on the refurb 980, but would really prefer to get something with 6gb or 8gb of ram. Later on I plan on upgrading the CPU to something like a 4790k to round out the system.
 
If you're going to buy new, the GTX 1080 is much faster than the Vega 56, and uses half the power. That's no contest.

Refurb/used is a bit tighter, but the 980 is still slightly faster than the 390, and will use less power.

If the Fury is just a normal card and not the Fury X, then the performance is only slightly higher than the GTX 980. Stay away for that price (would be a deal for $250 or so).

Here's a quick guide for GPU performance, from the 1080 release review:

perfrel_2560_1440.png


The 1080 is the only card above $200 on your list that's even worth looking at. It's almost twice as fast as the $200 cards, and more than twice as fast as your 280x.

The 980/390 would be the bare-minimum card worth upgrading to.
 
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I'd say a couple reburb 980 if you are really into 1440p gaming with all eyecandy on.
Yes a new mobo would be in order
 
Yeah sadly the miners sky rocketed the price of AMD GPUs. I paid $219 in January for my Sapphire R9 Fury from Newrgg. The price is now over double.
 
Used SLI 980s would be $400, plus a new SLI compatible motherboard ($100-200 I guess). Vs $550 for a new GTX 1080. I had my 280x's in crossfire before and it looks like multi-GPU setups are still as much of a headache as ever, so I'd be spending the same or more money on a similar setup that would cause all kinds of headaches. If I had an sli motherboard maybe I'd buy one 980 and buy a second one later, but it doesn't look like it makes much sense right now.
 
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